New cooperation models for the energy market transition

The electricity sector is in a state of accelerated development and disruptive change. Wind and solar energy have become low-cost alternatives, electric vehicles are increasing and more and more private and commercial consumers are generating their own electricity, making them prosumers. At the same time digitalization, decentralized storage and demand side management open up new business options. All these developments have their own challenges, but they also offer new possibilities for established power companies as well as newcomers.

Power companies can engage in many strategies to take advantage of the current energy transition, e.g., they can expand regionally, develop new markets, services and business models as well as introduce innovative technologies. Many of these strategies also come with uncertainty. Therefore, it can make sense to tackle them through collaborations in order to access specific resources and competencies and to share risks and assets.

Yet the question of whether to form a partnership or not, leads to further questions for power companies: What does the collaboration entail? What are the potential risks? Which partners are suitable? In order to shed light on these questions, the ninth SCCER CREST white paper, attempts to elucidate the following:

Selection of suitable cooperation partners (start-ups vs. prosumers)

Number of partners (bilateral vs. multilateral collaborations)

Purpose of the collaboration (technology or market development)

For this, the authors investigated different power companies and energy start-ups in Switzerland and abroad. The white paper outlines the key findings.